The WRight Way
By Ron Wright
(Cazenovia, NY- Aug. 2014) The story goes on about a law firm seeking to discover whatever they could about a large local company. An attorney and several interns start pacing outside the headquarters of the firm under surveillance. One diligent intern starts shouting through a bull horn:
“We want to see copies of all your records: emails, handwritten notes, photocopies, file cabinet contents, photographs, scribbled notes, confidential files, computer software, archived reel-to-reel tapes, notebook entries and any other electronic or hand written records. We’ll give you exactly one hour to hand everything over, or else!”
A face appears at a third-story window of the building and meekly inquires about what all the noise is for. Undaunted, the group on the sidewalk (hereafter referred to as “LT” for legal team) continue with a flurry of demands and threats. Several minutes later, the person from the third-floor window appears at the ground-floor entry doors to explain that the company went bankrupt four years ago and that that the LT may wish to check around the corner regarding a for sale sign on the building.
This only enrages the LT, and in a few minutes marshals arrive, enter the building and drag out three people in handcuffs. One of the individuals is a custodian/night watchman who was supposed to be on vacation that day but was filling in for a sick co-worker. The man was carrying several wastebaskets. These were immediately snatched and stuffed into evidence bags.
The LT on the scene is now convinced someone is hiding things. Everyone knows that janitors, custodians and night watchmen have many extra hours on their shifts to goof off and read through the implicating stuff in wastebaskets. This is fantastic confidential material that company employees throw away every day – a treasure trove of evidence.
Janitors must know about everything going on at a business … the LT is firmly convinced of this. Maybe it’s the minimum wage plus the thrill of reading very important wastebasket documents at 3 a.m. Then, of course, the custodian can be blamed for being partly responsible for marketing plans and for at least a part of the “weaseling-out” of responsibility for selling such shoddy merchandise and services. Makes good ad copy for the law firm – almost as good as blaming heartless insurance companies for drunken drivers, global warming, vicious dogs and banana peels on the sidewalk.
OK … so LT won’t be tricked into talking with various former mere department managers who were paid to sit at their desks and look important. This real live custodian has got to be sitting on a treasure trove of discoverables. The LT knows any big company must spend at least 20 percent of their gross income hiding and deleting files, covering up for junk foisted on an unsuspecting public and other heartless activities. Hey … aren’t they capitalists?
So what is the best way to make a sniveling janitor spill the beans? Just about anything short of United Nations-prohibited torture. Maybe by throwing his brooms, dust mops and plungers into a raging bonfire and forcing him to watch them being incinerated. Scream for mercy, you low-life garbage-can-dunper. Oh we’re going to get this guy to talk … or else.
The LT finally prevails, and the exhausted custodial employee gives up and talks for an hour about his exploits as a lifelong reader of wadded-up paperwork soaked and corrupted with stale coffee stains, sticky gum wads and icky used tissues. Tough work, but somebody has to do it. Booted out on the street, said janitor takes off running down the sidewalk promising himself never, ever to look directly at the contents of any corporate wastebasket again as long as he lives.
Do you think this can’t happen to you? What have you done today to prove yourself innocent if you happen to be in the business of cleaning offices and there are no video cameras watching you as you make your rounds during the third shift? You are a suspect, my friend.
Ron Wright of Cazenovia is a retiree with keen interest in his family, history, politics and his church. He began putting his thoughts on paper a little over a decade ago to share with family and friends. Ron, whose column appears the third edition each month, may be reached at madnews@m3pmedia.com.